Mist and Rain
by Nastrandir
Summary: After surviving Rashemen, the former Knight-Captain of Crossroad Keep returns to West Harbour in search of some kind of peace.
1. Chapter 1

_This story is rather different in tone from my last one, and going to be not nearly as long - maybe three or four chapters. It comes from a small idea that I had a couple of days ago, so I hope it works. A few things may differ from what is said and implied at the end of the OC and MOTB - mostly to do with who survives and is still in West Harbour. Usual disclaimer still applies - everything except the main character belongs to Bioware._

_**Chapter One  
**_

It was raining the day she returned to West Harbour, much as it had been the day she left. Soft, grey drizzle seeping through low branches and running down thick bark and soaking into the deep, green moss. Her hair was damp and wisping at her temples, and her boots were leaking. The pack she carried kept her back dry, but her cape and leathers were wicking up water. Not that she cared, not now; she had travelled too long and too far to worry that small raindrops ran down the back of her neck or fell from her forehead as she walked.

She had heard the rumours all along the coast, that the bull-headed tenacity of the Mere farmers meant they had returned – those that survived, in any case. Returned to the swamps and the greenness and the ever-pervading smell of wet earth. The last she had seen of the village, most of the buildings still smouldered, while shadows played in the wreckage. She wondered how many had left in time, how many of them had escaped. Bevil Starling had told her that some of them had, but even he did not know true numbers.

She had walked the weeks-long journey from Crossroad Keep, and refused the horse she had been offered. The Knight-Captain's sudden and shocking return from the wilds of Rashemen had sent the keep into uproar, with messengers sent at all haste for Neverwinter and Sir Nevalle scrabbling to arrange some kind of proper celebration. When she had sent him away wearily, explaining that she merely wished to rest a few days, and then he could do whatever the hells he cared with the keep, he had looked almost relieved.

She had discovered Khelgar firmly ensconced in the Phoenix Tail Inn, along with Sand and Neeshka, and had whiled away a few days in friendly conversation. They talked of the others who had fallen in Merdelain, except Bishop, and she told them of her quest in faraway Rashemen. She spoke of those she had met there, of Safiya, the Red Wizard, who was not entirely whole, and Okku the Bear-God, and Gann-of-Dreams, the hagspawn to whom she had bidden a soft farewell at the borders of Rashemen. There had been Kaelyn the Dove as well, who had fallen beneath the misguided passion of her own doomed crusade.

Some details she kept to herself, not trusting herself to speak of them yet; the curse that had left her hollow and almost dead, and Akachi's memories, that had burrowed so deep into her that she had been no longer sure whether her thoughts were hers or his.

Despite Khelgar's protests, she left with the dawn some days later, after a vague promise to see them again sometime. Her path took her to Neverwinter, and a brief stop at The Sunken Flagon, where Duncan spoiled her for a good fortnight or so. They traded tales of old adventures; he, of past times when he had ventured half-drunk into orc caves, and she, of the time the Ashenwood had woken and taken to vengeance, and she had in turn beaten the blights of the forest back and called the Wood Man from his slumber.

After agreeing that she had seen stranger things, Duncan packed her off on the road to West Harbour with a bag full of coin, a bottle of his oldest whiskey, and a fierce hug that had almost made her want to waste another month or so in his company.

Now, beneath the steadily falling rain, she followed the old, fern-fringed track towards the slope of the green. Most of the houses were rebuilt, she noticed, and lights burned within. The afternoon sun had long been lost behind swathes of cloud, and the shadows lengthened. She passed the drooping willow trees, and the huge log she had once fallen off as a child. Bevil had laughed at her, she remembered, to take her mind from the impressive scrape she earned.

A quick glance across the river showed her Daeghun's house, still standing, and as uninviting as she recalled. No lanterns flickered behind the windows, but she knew that meant nothing useful. He had rarely bothered with lights, save the odd candle or two, and in any case, she did not know if he was home or out in the forest.

Not quite able to make herself cross the bridge and knock at his door and find out, she turned her steps instead towards the old Starling farm. Here, light blazed against panes and under the line of the door. She wondered briefly how she was going to appear to them – half-starved and worn out, no doubt – before knotting one hand and knocking.

She heard footsteps and a male voice first. "Yes, Ma. I hear it. Probably Tarmas, come scrounging for a good meal."

The door swung wide, and Bevil Starling gaped at her. "Rhythien..?"

She nodded awkwardly. "Remember me?"

"Rhythien…I thought you were…" Bevil shook his head. "Gods, what am I saying? Come in, you look exhausted."

He hauled her into the hall, and she saw familiar wood paneling and candlelight. Retta's voice floated quizzically down from the dining room, and Bevil called back, "Hold on a moment."

He closed the door and stared hard at her. "Rhythien, where have you been all this time?"

"Long story." She swiped a hand across her forehead, scattering raindrops. "I'm sorry for intruding…"

"Intruding? Don't be silly. You never intrude, you know that." Bevil stared at her again and then laughed. "Gods, I'm sorry. I can't believe…we all thought you were dead. Here, let me have your cape."

She shed her pack and her cape, and her swordbelt and weapons followed. "I was at Crossroad Keep a few weeks ago. Sand told me you'd come home."

Bevil nodded. "Didn't take a shine to being a soldier, after all. Seemed more use to come back here and do something worthwhile." He grasped her elbow, steered her into the dining room where Retta sat. Steam rose up from uncovered dishes, and Rhythien's stomach growled.

"Great Gods above." Retta shoved her chair back. "Rhythien, child. You're back?"

"Yes." She let Bevil guide her into a seat near his mother. "Yes…been a long time, yes?"

Retta motioned to her son. "Don't just stand there. Get the poor girl some food."

While Bevil busied himself with a spoon and a plate, Retta clasped Rhythien's cold hands. "We thought we'd lost you, child. After all that business in Neverwinter, and then you taken off to that castle." She patted Rhythien's palm. "Good to have you back, child."

Rhythien nodded numbly. A plate appeared in front of her, and the familiar smells of roasted vegetables and sliced meat invaded her mouth and nose. She stared at the swirl of rich gravy. "Retta, Bevil…I'm sorry. I just…I haven't talked to anyone in a while."

"Don't apologise to us, child." Retta found her a cup of ale, placed it beside her. "You just eat, and then you can talk if you want."

She nodded again, and dug into mashed potatoes and pumpkin and carrots. Days of trail rations had left her craving for real, hot food, and she had almost forgotten how wonderful a cook Retta Starling was. The potatoes swam with butter, and the meat was tender. She drank, and the almost-forgotten, slightly bitter taste of the ale slid down her throat.

How much else had she forgotten, she wondered, while wandering the snowy forests of Rashemen, fighting the curse that slowly ate at her?

"Retta?"

"Yes, child?"

"Is…" She looked up from her over laden fork. "Is Daeghun at home?"

"No, sweetheart." Retta smiled gently. "He took himself off into the forest a tenday or so ago. Not expecting him back for another, I reckon."

She nodded slowly. "Do you mind if…could I stay with you? Until he comes back?"

"Of course you can, child. You don't even have to ask. You know that." Retta squeezed her hand. "I'll leave you two alone. Keep eating, sweetheart. You could do with it."

Rhythien scooped up another mouthful of pumpkin and nodded silently again. Left alone with the man who had been the boy she had grown up with, she could think of nothing to say. She had last seen him when Crossroad Keep had been attacked, and the siege had begun in the darkest hours of the night. She had been woken from an uneasy sleep by the ranger, Bishop, who had asked again if she wanted to run away.

The attack had been brutal, and Bevil had been wounded. Touring the infirmary afterwards, she had seen older scars on him, the marks of the torture he would not speak of. And then events had hurtled along ahead of her, and she had ventured out into Merdelain with the others, and had not known if Bevil had lived.

"Rhythien," Bevil said quietly. "You know I searched for you, don't you? Me and Daeghun, we both did…we went after you, into Merdelain, but we found nothing."

She blinked. "You did?"

"Nevalle's soldiers had already been there, and pulled out Sand and Neeshka and Khelgar. We went in after them and combed over that place stone by stone."

"You and…Daeghun?"

"Yes." Bevil topped up his drink. "I know you think he…anyway, he came with me. Did all the scouting, really. We turned the whole place inside out and came up with nothing but old bones and odd track marks. Khelgar swore blind he'd seen you carried off by something, and I thought, well, maybe he was right."

"He was right." She mopped up the last of the gravy with a thick crust of bread. "They were gargoyles. They took me to Rashemen."

"They…what?"

She shrugged tiredly. "Can I save that one for tomorrow?"

"Sure. Look, you look like you're about to keel over. You want to sleep?"

She nodded. "Bevil?"

"Mmm?"

"Thanks."

"No problem." He grinned good-naturedly. "Come on. You can have the small room upstairs."

She followed him unsteadily, realized just how tired she was. Had she even slept properly since leaving Rashemen? Maybe at The Sunken Flagon, she conceded, but most nights she woke coated in cold sweat. Remembering staring at the Wall of the Faithless, or facing down Myrkul's sneering remains, or walking the silent, grey streets of the City of the Dead. Other nights she dreamed of Akachi, and his descent from boy in fierce love to madman without a face. _And how easy could it have been, for her to succumb to the curse, and let it turn her into nothing, as well? _

"Here you go." Bevil pushed the door open, handed her a candle, fluttering in its brass holder. "Sleep as long as you want, Rhythien."

"Thank you." She gazed into the room and wondered what would plague her sleep this night. "Bevil, where are the little ones?"

"Not so little anymore." He smiled widened, then faded. "You know about Danan?"

She nodded; she did. Killed when the village had been destroyed, the youngest Starling sibling she remembered only as tiny and vivacious. "What about the others?"

"With Tarmas, and learning how to hold a sword properly with Georg." He shrugged. "Stubborn to the core, both of them."

"That's good to know." She mustered up a pale smile. "Goodnight, Bevil."

He inclined his head and left her to the shadows and the soft twilight streaming in through the window. She left the curtains half-open; she did not care for darkness. She unpinned her hair, ran her fingers through the thick tresses. She kicked off her boots and stripped off her tunic and leggings. Clad only in her shirt, she slipped beneath clean sheets and fell into sleep only bothered once by old nightmares.

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Perhaps out of old habit, she woke with the dawn light streaming through the curtains. She peered out through the panes at a misty, damp West Harbour morning. Thin grey tendrils wrapped around leaning tree trunks, and the grass glittered. She recalled hating this weather, this unceasing mugginess and grey skies. But now, after the cold and the bitterness of Rashemen, and the shadows of Merdelain, she could find little to fault in it.

She dressed quickly and quietly, and left her hair loose. She discovered Retta in the kitchen, kneading bread, white with flour to her elbows, and two loaves already baking. "Can I help?"

"No, child. I'm nearly done as it is." Retta pushed a stray lock out of her eyes. "Your hair is still long."

Rhythien nodded, a little self-conscious. "It seemed the only thing I took from here that did not change. So I kept it."

The clothes she had left in had been worn to holes and replaced; the sword, broken, and a new one forged, only to be cast aside in favour of the Sword of Gith. Even her own skin was traced with new scars, and she was certain her laugh sounded different.

"I understand, a little." Retta pounded the dough into shape. "When I first moved her from Neverwinter to be with Bevil's father, I had the longest, most lovely blonde hair."

Rhythien smiled. Even Daeghun had mentioned once that Retta had been considered beautiful in her youth. "Sounds enviable."

"I kept it past my waist for nearly fifteen years." She sighed, lifted the tray into the oven. "I decided I was absolutely determined that this place was not going to make me regret having the most impractical hair."

"How old were you?"

"When I came here? Oh, younger than you, child. Seventeen, I think." Retta wiped her hands. "Bevil's outside, somewhere. Should be chopping wood, but you know how that boy daydreams."

"Retta…"

The older woman glanced across at her. "Yes, sweetheart?"

"You know…" Rhythien shivered. "Bevil did some amazing things at Crossroad Keep. I expect he does not talk about it much, but…you should be so proud of him."

"Oh, he doesn't, as you'd imagine. And I am, sweetheart. Very much so." Retta smiled, but she saw the edge of sorrow beneath. "Now take yourself outside for some fresh air, and remember to come back for lunch."

Rhythien recovered her cape by the door, and almost went to buckle on her sword. So long, it had been it seemed, that she had worn weapons as comfortably as any piece of clothing. She stared at the longsword and its tarnished, oft-used hilt, and decided firmly to leave it hanging beside the door.

Feeling curiously vulnerable, she stepped outside into the clammy mist and breathed in. The air tasted of moisture and mildew and leaves. She made her way between the leaning, dark houses, the earth beneath her feet soft with dew. A short walk took her to the solitude of the encroaching trees, and she paused. She recalled Daeghun leading her through these forests, making her inspect each log and twig and draped vine. He had seen tracks and prints she could not for the life of her point out amid the mud and the clinging ferns.

She wasted the better part of the morning sitting on a low-hanging branch and staring at the twining mist. Afterwards, she meandered back towards the farmhouse and found Bevil picking potatoes in the vegetable garden. She helped him and they worked in companionable silence, as they had so many years ago.

But the gulf of Rashemen and the curse still hung between them, she knew. She wanted to explain, to tell him why she was so thin, or why her eyes were so hollow. But something stopped her, and she wondered what.

"Rhythien?"

She glanced up, startled as he clasped her wrist. "Yes?"

"Come and sit down." He guided her onto the low stone wall and sighed. "Rhythien…I feel like I know you and I don't know you. Know what I mean?"

She nodded.

"I know you must've been through a lot…hells, I can't imagine what you've seen. But…" Bevil's forehead creased. "I'd really like to know about it. Remember when we were seven?"

She nodded slowly. "Didn't we promise never to keep secrets?"

"Yes. Can you tell me about it?"

Haltingly, she did. She told him of waking in the barrow, amid a sea of pain. Of meeting Safiya and travelling to Mulsantir, and learning of vague clues as to Lienna's whereabouts. Of how the strange trail had led to stepping through a shadow portal and finding Kaelyn in Myrkul's vault. Of how she had enlisted the help of an imprisoned hagspawn to aid her in fighting a legion of angered spirits.

"Gann-of-Dreams?" Bevil frowned. "Odd name."

"He was a dream-walker. Spirit shaman. He was my friend."

"Just a friend?"

"Yes. We parted, and I miss him, but…we were never more than friends." She had helped him find his mother in Coveya Kur'gannis, and he had pledged his loyalty when they had stepped through the Betrayer's Gate. She explained the rest of the story, of how Okku the Bear-God had joined them, and how their quest had led to Thay, and Myrkul, and finally to the City of Judgment, and Kelemvor himself.

But still, she neglected to mention the hunger in detail, or how it had left her doubled over and screaming some nights, while Gann held her hands and whispered to her than it would not take her, that he would not let it.

"And after all that, you just came back here?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

She stared down at the rich earth beneath her feet. "Why not?"

"You could've been the Knight-Captain again."

"I never wanted that."

"I know." Bevil scuffed his feet. "Rhythien? You know at the siege?"

"Yes."

"When the ranger broke the gates…"

She bit her lip. She had known this would come, that he would want to speak of it. Sand and Neeshka and Khelgar had been considerate enough not to, but Bevil was obstinate, and her oldest friend, and under no such strictures. "Yes."

"Did you know he was going to do it?"

"No," she answered truthfully. When he scowled, she heard herself snap, "Yes, I shared his bed. Yes, I was a fool. Yes, he tried to tempt me with leaving with him. No, I did not know what he planned."

Bevil exhaled slowly. "You're not a fool."

"I believed he cared for me. I chose not to see some very obvious signs. I was a fool."

"I don't think so."

"It's done, anyway, and he's dead." She raked her hands through the loose hair at her temples.

"How?"

"In Merdelain," she answered distantly. "I killed him."

Bevil blinked slowly. "You killed him."

"He was waiting for us, with Garius. I went up to him, and I listened to him." Her voice sounded absent and hollow even to herself. "He talked, and I listened. I made the others wait. And, just when he was finished, I let him kiss me. And I stabbed him in the stomach."

Bevil swallowed. "Why?"

"He betrayed us. He broke the gates. You said so yourself."

"Yes, but…" Bevil twisted his hands together. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't've asked."

"It's alright." She gazed down at the turned-over earth, at the way it speckled her boots where she sat. "Bevil?"

"Yes?"

"Do you think Daeghun will want to see me?"

"What?" Bevil shook his head. "Of course he will. He scoured Merdelain for you. Why wouldn't he?"

She shrugged. "Did he ever talk about me?"

"No. No, he didn't. You know what he's like."

She did, but it did not stop the sudden, sharp pain. "Yes, I do." Her gaze travelled across the garden, to where the opposite wall gave way to damp green, and finally to the stand of trees. "I'm going for a walk."

"Rhyth?" He used the nickname he had decided on when they were both ten or so. For once, it did not raise a smile from her. "Rhyth, are you alright?"

She nodded. "Yes."

The forest was as silent and accepting as it had been earlier that morning. She retraced her steps, then walked further, past tall trees and ducking under hanging vines. Toppled logs thick with moss crossed the path, and she vaulted over them before choosing a smooth boulder to perch and think on.

Twilight was turning the sky a lucent cobalt by the time she returned to the farmhouse. No mention was made of her missing lunch, but she noticed that Bevil's mother piled her dinner plate and made certain she ate every last scrap. She bid the two of them a polite goodnight and retreated to the silent safety of the room, and sank into an uneasy sleep that was broken by memories of Akachi and Daeghun.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Chapter Two**_

The days passed, some swifter than others. She helped Retta in the farmhouse, and re-learned how to bake bread and bottle preserves, and salt ham, and hang gamebirds in the shed. She chopped wood and pulled vegetables from the dew-damp earth with Bevil. She met Tarmas and Georg, and exchanged stories. She spent a good few evenings helping Georg with the militia, and enjoyed the simplicity of teaching sword drill. The small children she had remembered as tiny, scrappy nuisances were tall and itching to see the world, and a few of them even knew which way round to handle a blade. Some of them asked about Crossroad Keep, and whether the Greycloaks there were still taking recruits, and she firmly told them they had a few inches more to grow before embarking on any foolishness of any kind.

She sat one night in the dining room at the farmhouse and stared absently down into a bowl of stew.

"Rhythien, child?"

She blinked. "Yes, Retta?"

"Can I ask you something?"

Bevil was out with Georg, and not expected back for some time. She poked at the stew and nodded. "What?"

"Sweetheart, I can't help but notice…" Retta sighed. "You're not yourself."

"Aren't I?"

Retta shook her head. "I know war changes people. I've seen it before. But, child…you barely speak. I think sometimes you eat only because you know I would tan your hide if you didn't."

Rhythien smiled. "Of course I do."

"Sweetheart, do you need to talk about something?"

_Only the curse, _she thought. _Only the memories of Akachi that still wake me. Only the memories of facing the King of Shadows_. "No," she said. "I'm sorry, Retta. I can't. Not now."

"Very well." The older woman sighed again. "If you need to, though…"

"I know." She scooped up a spoonful of gravy. "I know. Thanks, Retta."

She dreamed that night of the dead. She saw Shandra first, with her blonde hair and strong, farmgirl's face, and those eyes that seemed to lance into her.

_Shandra, stumbling through a fencing lesson, swearing creatively as she realized that squaring off against Casavir was not the same as defending her farm against a ragged troop of lizardfolk. Then Shandra again, blood welling from her hand as she opened the gateway to her grandfather's haven. _

_In the dream, Rhythien screamed. She knew, Gods how she _knew_, what was coming next. Shandra manipulated by Koroboros, and Mephasm's curiously soft words, and more Jerro blood spilled on the elegant, burning runes on the floor of the haven. But she watched again as the farmgirl fell, and her grandfather turned his thwarted anger on her still living companions. _

_Grobnar was next, as she knew he would be. With his mind halfway on some other plane half the time, and his hands usually on some bizarre invention. He had fallen in Merdelain, and she had done nothing to save him as the pillars came crashing down. Then Casavir, quiet acceptance behind his blue eyes, and loyal to the end, even as the rocks came tumbling down. Qara followed, and whatever bitter satisfaction Rhythien had felt when the sorceress had died was long spent. Now, she saw only a girl, red-haired and slender, her eyes rolling up and a shriek tearing from her throat. _

_Zhjaeve and Elanee, the githzerai lost among the rubble, and the druid in Merdelain. Kaelyn in the City of Judgment, and Ammon Jerro, in Thay. More names, more faces, the Greycloaks she never bothered to know properly, the merchants at the Keep who were caught in the carnage when Garius' troops seethed through the gates. All the people in the Mere, the swamp farmers and travelers caught as the shadows rose and spread and engulfed. _

_And finally Bishop, last as she knew he would be. Trapped in the Wall of the Faithless, the man she had called her mistake when exchanging tales with Gann. With a weary kind of resignation, Rhythien approached the Wall, and stood and listened as he screamed at her. It had been a long time since she had bothered to reply, to even lift her head enough to look at him properly. She recalled killing him, how easily her knife had slipped into his belly, and how he had shuddered. _

_The mist of Kelemvor's dead, cold world plucked at her knees and elbows, and turned the ends of her hair damp. With her throat tight and her eyes stinging behind closed lids, she tried to ignore Bishop's voice, and waited desperately for the dream to end. _

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The next dawn brought a thick cloak of fog, and Daeghun, returning from the forest. He arrived as the greyness was melted by the sunrise, and Rhythien saw him through the parted curtains. Awake for too long already, she watched him make his way elegantly across the green to the bridge.

She skipped breakfast that morning and paced instead. Wondering why she even cared, she could not quite decide whether to braid her hair or wear it loose. She pulled her leathers on and laced her boots up furiously. She had faced countless enemies and come through breathing; the King of Shadows had fallen before the Sword of Gith; she had fought the Faceless Man and freed him, despite the blood that ran from her wounds, and the pain that racked her.

Why, then, did she feel such fluttering apprehension at the thought of facing Daeghun Farlong again?

Despite what some of the villagers had said, despite how Bevil had referred to him as they were growing up, he was never _Father_. He never expected it, and nor did she offer it. They had been uneasy accomplices in a kind of silent acceptance; he was horribly broken, and she was waiting to leave.

And yet she was here, again, now, and wanting to see him.

She stared through the window at the mantling mist and wondered why.

After grappling with her thoughts a while longer, she wrenched herself away and downstairs. She ducked past the kitchen, guiltily avoiding Retta. She slipped out the front door, pressing close to the wall so Bevil would not see her if he was awake and already in the vegetable garden, or at the woodshed.

She crossed the bridge, and tried to quell her hammering nerves. She had grown up with Daeghun, always distant, sometimes there, often not. He had given her nothing except the certainty of sorrow, and unanswered questions, and sudden, fierce loyalty when he had arrived at Crossroad Keep and pledged his fealty to her cause.

She pushed at the door without knocking, and it swung inwards. She waited, observed the dust that blanketed the wooden floor, and the paneling beyond. A shadow slanted across the doorway, and she heard his voice. "Rhythien?"

She looked across, and into his pale eyes. That gaze, deep enough to hide a lifetime of secrets, and never give them up. He was as she remembered, slight of build and graceful, his face angular and pale. Dressed in ranger's leathers, soft green and light brown, and a bow slung over his shoulders. Dark hair, falling past his shoulders, thick and glossy. He would have been attractive, had his eyes not held that wall of sadness.

"Hello, Daeghun."

"When did you return?" His voice was almost monotone, as she expected.

"Around eleven days ago. I came up from Crossroad Keep."

"You must have quite a story to tell."

"Yes. Care to hear it?"

He tilted his head. "Where have you been sleeping?"

"At the Starling farmhouse. Don't panic, I didn't sneak in here while you were away."

His expression did not flicker. "Will you be here long?"

"I don't know."

"Ah. Will you be staying at the Starling farmhouse tonight?"

His voice gave nothing away, and she felt a twinge of regret. But still, she knew him, and part of her had expected nothing less. "Depends."

"On what?"

She glanced around, at the low beams, and the dust. "Do you want to come for a walk?"

"I've only just returned."

"Yes, but I know you hate walls and roofs. Especially ones covered in dust."

His eyes narrowed slightly. "True enough."

Out in the forest, far enough behind the treeline that the gables and rooftops vanished, he seemed to breathe a little easier. He had always preferred the outdoors, she knew, and she remembered feeling stupidly remorseful as a child for keeping him in the village. They walked in silence, Rhythien following, and she admired his quick, careful paces as he stepped between the ferns. He was slender and agile, and just matched her for height. He led her to a glade where the trees were tall and almost impenetrable, lined with hanging vines. There, he sat cross-legged on a flat boulder and regarded her.

He never began conversations unless he really could not help it, she remembered. "I've been in Rashemen," she said.

"Indeed. That is a goodly way. How did you manage to find yourself there?"

His flat, almost disinterested tone threatened to break her. She stared down at her hands, clasped in her lap, and then at his, laced over his knee. "After the rocks fell in Merdelain, there were gargoyles."

For the first time since waking up in the barrow, words spilled from her lips. She found herself telling him _everything_, and not hating his silence. Instead, she noticed the intent tilt of his head, and his unblinking gaze as he listened. She spoke of the curse and the hunger as soon as it had occurred; that first time, when it ripped out of her in the barrow, and engulfed the wolf-spirit. She told him of her disbelief in Kaelyn's naïveté, and her rueful lack of surprise when the winged woman turned on her in the City of Judgment. She told him of the mask pieces she had found in dreams.

She told him _everything_. How the hunger had kept her awake and in terror of what she might do asleep. How she had given herself to the ranger, only to be betrayed, to kill him, and meet him again in a treacherous dreamscape. How she had quailed at the thought of going up against the King of Shadows, how she had screamed her hatred at Garius in Merdelain. How so many of them had died, and somehow she had not, and had been made to go on.

Daeghun gazed at her through those pale eyes and did not move. "You have had quite a journey."

"Yes." She laughed then, a desperate, gulping sort of laugh. "What do you think of it?"

"That you have seen enough to trouble many a man for a lifetime and more." His gaze swept across her. "You do not look well."

"I'm fine."

"You're too thin."

"Retta's feeding me well enough."

"Of that I have no doubt." His fingers slipped up, toyed with the end of his bow. "Would you…would you care to eat with me tonight?"

She smiled. "Of course. Though I'm not sure which of us is the worse cook."

"I'm not a bad cook."

"No, but you're too practical."

One side of his mouth twitched. "Perhaps. I killed a deer yesterday. How does venison sound?"

"Divine. I'll do the potatoes."

They meandered back to the village in silence, stepping over logs and tangled roots and past small pools. Daeghun retreated into the shed to start treating some new furs, and Rhythien vanished upstairs. She found her way into his study, and to his impressive, surprising book collection. For an elf who spent most of his time hunting or tracking or avoiding wooden walls, he owned an eye-opening array of books.

She chose an old tome of ballads, much dog-eared from her childhood, and sank into the big chair by the fireplace. Much later, when the sky had darkened, and Daeghun had washed the smell of fur and cut meat off his hands, he motioned her into the kitchen to help with dinner.

Chopping potatoes, she idly glanced at him as turned a large chunk of deer meat on the spit. "You know, most people would have questions."

"What about?"

"About what I did in Rashemen."

"I thought you said you'd told me everything."

"I did, but normal people would still ask things."

"Would they?" He looked up, his dark hair disheveled and his face smooth. "I supposed that if you want to say anything more, you will, and I will listen."

"Oh." She sliced the last potato into small cubes and dropped the whole lot into a bubbling pan. "But if I did that, you'd never say anything."

"What?"

"If I supposed you were going to talk when you wanted to, you never would."

The silence stretched, fragile and waiting. Daeghun's gaze flicked from the venison to her and back again. "No," he said eventually, "I suppose not."

She dished up the food and he found an old, dusty bottle of elven wine that was going to no other good use on a back shelf in the kitchen. Rain streaked against the dining room window. Rhythien picked up her cutlery and wondered what she should say next. "Daeghun?"

"Yes?"

"Would you talk if asked?"

"It depends on the question."

She speared the venison, watched the steam twine up. "You know, Duncan once said he was surprised you hadn't cracked down the middle."

"He would." His voice held no rancor. "He talked too easily, and usually with the help of cheap ale."

She ate silently, as did he, and curiously realized that she did not feel uncomfortable. Rather, the patter of the rain was soothing, as was his wordless presence across the table. Later, after she helped him clear away the dishes, they sat outside on the rise above the river, and looked at the night-time mist that carpeted the grass between the houses and drifted from the trees. The rain still fell, soft and cool, splashing down onto her unbound hair.

She had brought the whiskey Duncan had given her, and she uncorked it thoughtfully. "Join me?"

"In prime rotgut? Your tastes are slipping."

Even so, he accepted the bottle and took a generous sip. Watching, she smiled. "How do you know what my tastes are?"

"Because I know you stole those bottles of elven wine from my pantry when you were fifteen."

"True enough, but you can't buy elven wine when you're in the middle of a war, generally. One lives with what one can."

He stared out at the lapping river. "I don't quite believe you."

She sighed. "You're right. Once I was given the keep, I kept meaning to go down to the Phoenix Tail and get roaring drunk to forget about it all, but…I didn't. Is that strange?"

"No. Did you stay up worrying, instead? Not sleeping?"

"Yes. Do you know how many times I slept in the casement, after spending hours just staring out at Merdelain?"

His face softened. "Too many, I'd wager."

"You'd be right. Why did you come to Crossroad Keep?"

His eyes did not move from the dark river, speckled with rain. "I told you at the time. You had done well, and had many serving you. I wished to aid you, in your fight against the King of Shadows."

"Is that all?"

For a long moment, he did not stir. "I was afraid, as well. I had heard the rumours, that Rhythien Trarell was to hold a keep in honour of Neverwinter, and to take the fight to the shadows in the heart of Merdelain. I had seen the shadows in the Mere, and I had heard the whispers of the dark hunter on the wind. I knew what you would face, and I was afraid."

She did not turn to him, did not quite dare to. Despite what Georg had once suggested, she had never taken Daeghun's family name; it had never seemed right, since he had never encouraged her to call him anything other than his first name. The name she ended up with had been her father's surname, he said, in one of his rare bouts of conversation. "And afterwards?" she asked. "When Merdelain collapsed, and I wasn't there?"

"I looked for you," he answered. "I searched…I found nothing. I returned here, and I wondered if I had missed something."

"You, the perfect ranger? You could track a wisp across water."

His mouth moved slightly. "Perhaps."

The rain hissed down onto the river, and she realized her shoulders and the tops of her legs were soaking through. "May I ask you something?"

"You can ask."

"Would you…" She glanced down at her hands, white and knotted against her knees. "Would you tell me about Esmerelle and Shayla?"

His intake of breath was quiet, almost imperceptible. "Surely Duncan spilled all that."

"No, he didn't. He told me Esmerelle's name, and that they both died the night the village was attacked, but that was it. He said you would tell me when you were ready."

"Did he, indeed?" Daeghun blinked slowly. "I suppose I have kept this from you too long. It's just…the years to me, they flit by so quickly."

She mustered a slight smile. "Some of us aren't blessed with your lifespan."

"Blessed?" His pale eyes were vacant. "If that's what you wish to call it. I knew your mother when she was very young."

"Was she like me?"

"She was human, if that's what you mean. I knew nothing of your father, save the name she brought with her." He glanced at her then, and she saw the pain in his eyes. "She travelled with me, and with Shayla, and other friends of ours, for quite some time. At least, in her years. Shayla and I came here after our band broke up, and I agreed to act as the village's ranger."

"What was Shayla like?"

"Beautiful." A wistful note threaded into his voice. He held out a hand, watched the rain spatter against his palm. "Generous. She talked a lot and smiled more. She was a gifted fighter, when she needed to be, and a better healer. She acted as midwife to the women here, and they loved her." A frown creased his forehead. "And then…the village was attacked."

She wanted to reach out, clasp his hand, let him know that he did not have to explain this in stiff solitude. But she knew he would probably bolt, push her away, and retreat back into silence. She could not remember a single hug she had received from him; his hands had only touched her when he patched small hurts, or handed her things, or that time he had pulled her clear of a snare in the forest.

"Esmerelle and Shayla…they were in the thick of it." His voice was distant, but she saw him draw in a long, shuddering breath. "Esmerelle tried to shield you, and she was killed."

"When the sword shattered."

"Yes." His gaze was fixed on some far-off point of memory. "The shard…you know the rest."

"Yes," she murmured.

"And Shayla…I found her. I'd gone to rouse the militia, and when I came back, your mother and Shayla…" His eyes closed, and a tremor shook him. "She was dead."

"I'm sorry," Rhythien said, quietly. She tried to remember if she had ever told him that, and was not sure. "Daeghun, I am so sorry."

His lashes flickered, and his eyes opened, brimming. She gazed across at him, startled silent. "Don't be," he said thickly. "Hardly your fault."

"No. But you were stuck with me afterwards."

Another shudder wracked him. "True enough. Do you know something?"

She shook her head wordlessly.

"I don't regret it."

What was there, she wondered, to say to such a confession? "Thank you," she said, simply.

She left him alone then, answering the unspoken plea in his face. She made her way back to the house, and to the room she had slept in while she lived with him. Outside, the rain still fell, and she saw him as she drew the curtains half across, sitting alone beside the river, gazing at the dark water.


	3. Chapter 3

_Just a tiny bit of editing, and thank you to Daeghun's Daughter for pointing out a couple of inconsistencies. _

_**Chapter Three**_

The days slipped past uncounted, and the season turned into a cool, damp autumn. This deep in the marshes, the leaves did not so much crackle and turn brown and fall, as curl and flop onto the damp loam beneath. While the flowers retreated, and the ground was occasionally crisped by an overnight frost thick enough to rime cabbages and turnips in the hard soil beneath, it did not snow properly. Flakes might sometimes drift down from troubled grey skies once the winter marched on, but they tended to melt against cold-coiled ferns and wet ground.

She found the simple, unquestioned rhythms of the village strangely soothing. But the nightmares still jarred her from sleep, and Daeghun had to remind her to eat, and Retta often came by the ranger's house to check that he was looking after her properly. She sometimes pushed the militia youngsters too hard, and Georg once had to wrench her away, and whisper in her ear that she was home, in West Harbour, and that the enemy at the other end of her sword was a fourteen-year-old boy.

Under an overcast sky, she trailed a meandering, absent path into the forest. Her shoulders ached from the morning's sword drill, and one too many questions about exactly what she had fought in Merdelain had made her crave silence. She followed an old, winding route through the tall, dripping trees, and past wide, dark pools. Something tickled at the back of her mind, and she looked up in time to see the old ruins, stark and bare.

_Just lumps of stone,_ she thought frantically. _Old columns and corridors, and just stone. _

But it was here she had been sent, that first night, while Daeghun and Brother Merring tended the wounded and the Mossfeld boys buried the dead. Together, she and Bevil had ventured into the looming ruins, and they had killed eight lizardlings between them. She remembered the oily, hot feel of their blood, splashing against her face.

And then later, when she had stepped through the Song Portal in Arvahn, and found herself back here, in these same ruins. She remembered the Reaver, with its skull wreathed in blue flame.

She reached out, touched her fingertips against the cold stone. Rough under her skin, and streaked with water. She recalled blundering through the door with Bevil, and finding the shard inside. It had been smaller than she imagined, a chunk of silver metal that felt curiously dry and cool against her hand when she touched it.

"Rhythien?"

She flinched and turned, saw Daeghun perched on a boulder behind her. "Yes?"

His head tilted up, indicating the sweep of early stars above, and the darkening sky. "It's late."

"Oh." She blinked quickly and wondered where the afternoon had gone. "I'm sorry. I went for a walk, and…"

"It is alright." He glanced past her, to the toppled columns and looming ruins behind. "May I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Why did you come out here?"

She pressed her hand against the stone again. "I'm not sure," she said, honestly. "Do you remember that night? When you sent me out here?"

"Yes." His pale eyes narrowed. "You were…so young."

Part of her wanted to say something foolish about still being young, about how she had not been away all that long, but the lengthening shadows and the feel of the stone under her fingers stopped her. "Did you know…where it would all lead?"

"Do you think I am gifted with foresight?" Daeghun sighed. "No, I did not know. I suspected the darkness growing in the Mere might have something to do with the shard, but I hoped not."

"When did you first feel it? The darkness in the Mere?"

He crouched on the boulder and thought, head tipped to one side. "Always," he said, quietly. "When Shayla and I first came here, there was always a shadow at the heart of the forest. The trees and the soil remember."

Rhythien stepped away from the wall, joined him. "I remember bad harvest years when I was growing up. I remember you looking even more dour than usual, and I always wondered what you were thinking."

Nothing sparked in his eyes. "Yes. Do you remember how hard the winters were, the two years before you left?"

She did; she remembered trying to chop damp firewood that was clotted with moss, lifting cabbages from the cold, wet earth while the rain hammered down. "Yes. It was strange. Everything was as it should have been, but nothing was growing properly."

Whole patches of crops turning yellowed and pale and half-rotten, she recalled. The game trails in the forest running curiously dry, and how the pigs sickened and died too easily. It had always seemed to her that the villagers conveniently forgot the bleakness of the colder months by the time summer rolled around, but she remembered Georg muttering to Brother Merring about poor weather and poorer crops, the day of the Harvest Fair.

"Come," Daeghun said. "We should head back. This swamp is treacherous in the dark."

"Even for your elven feet?"

A slight smile tugged at his mouth. "Sometimes."

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Rhythien gazed at the steam rising from the bubbling stewpot and tried to remember if she had ever been quite as content to help Daeghun with these simple domestic chores. Her childhood had been filled with days spent with Bevil and Amie, and evenings often enjoyed with the Starling brood, while she dreaded returning to a house that was more often than not empty.

"Daeghun?"

He looked up from where he stood sawing through a loaf of bread. "Yes?"

"May I ask you something?"

He nodded, so she said, "It's about the shard. And the battle."

His eyes did not flicker, did not even lift from the table in front of him. "Yes?"

"When my mother was killed…did you know I had a shard in me?"

"No, to begin with." He turned properly, and she saw the deep crease that lined the middle of his forehead. "I didn't even know you were alive, to begin with."

Without speaking, Rhythien spooned out the stew and carried the bowls to the table. Daeghun followed her, sat opposite her. His voice was distant, and his gaze seemed fixed on some indistinct point past her head. "All I could see was blood. I knew your mother was dead, and I had…seen Shayla. I knew I had to do something useful, so I checked you. I thought I was checking that you were dead."

She stared down into her stew, not quite able to speak.

"I picked you up," Daeghun said. "You were covered in blood. But then you cried, and you kicked me."

She laughed, startled and almost relieved. "I kicked you."

"Yes. I cleaned you up, and I found that most of the blood came from a deep gash on your chest. I saw the shard, or the end of it. I thought pulling it out might kill you, so I poured healing potions in you until the wound closed up."

"Over the shard."

"Yes." His gaze lifted and found hers, piercingly. "I sometimes think that if I had done things differently that night, perhaps…perhaps what you went through could have been avoided."

"No," she said, firmly. "No. The bladelings still would have come. The King of Shadows would have still risen. Daeghun, what you did saved me."

"Yes." He shook his head silently. "But I cannot help but think…things might have been different."

"You saved me," she said again.

"Afterwards," he murmured, "I wanted to leave. I wanted to get my bow and quiver, and walk off into the forest, and never come back."

"You didn't."

"I couldn't." He shrugged, and something very like wryness gleamed in his eyes. "It seemed I had an extra responsibility."

"Why, though?" She dug the spoon into the stew, pushed past chopped potatoes. "I mean…wasn't there anyone else who would've taken me in?"

"Retta Starling offered," he answered. "Even the priest we had at the time. Georg Redfell. Some of the other women, Shayla's friends." He drew in a deep, shaking breath, and she saw his eyes gain that old, worn distance again.

"Why did you turn them down?"

"I wanted to," he said, and she heard the raw honesty in his voice. "So many times I wanted to. Forgive me."

She shook her head at him. "Daeghun, there's nothing…stop it. There's nothing to forgive."

"I didn't turn them down because…well, when Esmerelle was carrying you, she asked Shayla if…if anything happened to her, would Shayla care for you."

Something twisted in her chest. She said nothing, only smiled at him. After a long, terse moment, he smiled back, and they ate in silence, while she wondered how he had kept such grief locked away inside himself for so long.

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When Daeghun left the village to scout the forest, or venture even further, into the wilderness beyond, she stopped asking him for permission and simply accompanied him. Their journeys criss-crossed the marshes, and she learned his ranger trails and the paths of wolves and bears on the higher slopes. He never once voiced a complaint at her company, and on one brittle morning when the frost lined the windowsill and she burrowed back under her blankets, he hauled her out of bed and ignored her protests.

He showed her tracks that wound high up into slate-sided mountains and past caves that hid waterfalls and twisting tunnels. He led her up to the heights where the snowline started, and when she shivered in recollection of Rashemen and the curse, he wrapped her shoulders with his cloak and guided her back down into the forest below. She learned that fishing in clear streams frustrated her no end, though she had some aptitude for trapping.

Sewing the pelt of a wolf into a cape one night, beside a small fire, she asked, "Why did you never bring me on these journeys of yours before?"

"Before you left, you mean? I did not think you were interested."

"You never asked."

"No."

She stabbed the needle into her thumb and swore. "I hate this."

He laughed, a small snap of a laugh. "Let me save you."

She tossed the pelt to him. "Please do, sir knight."

The winter crept on, bringing harsh wind from the marshes, and bitter cold. She found herself waking to brittle dawns most mornings, and joining Bevil in chopping firewood behind the Starling farmhouse. She took to wearing an extra layer of fur again, and her thoughts kept wandering back to Rashemen, and the snowy cold of the Ashenwood, and the Wells of Lurue.

Her own screams woke her one night. She lurched upright and flinched away when she saw a figure against the window.

"It's me," Daeghun said quickly. "I heard you…a nightmare?"

"Yes." She combed her hair back behind her ears. Her gaze fixed on the wet, heavy snowflakes drifting past the panes. "I…the curse. When we were at the Wells of Lurue, I…I ate the spirits of bears. Telthors. I _ended_ them."

When the hunger had harrowed her, and she could suppress it no longer, she would beg Safiya to call an elemental. Such bare stopgap tactics seemed to inflame rather than sate the hunger, but her conscience would not let her swallow up telthors like so much useless meat.

"It did not usually happen like that," she said unsteadily. "But I was so tired that day, so exhausted. I thought I could control it, but…"

"Ssh. It's alright." He did not move to comfort her, but his eyes softened in the gloom. "You don't need to explain yourself. I understand."

He left her to her thoughts, and she sat out the rest of the night, watching the snow falling. By the time the sun rose, pale and thin above a mantle of grey mist, the flakes had melted against the wet earth, and the village no longer reminded her of Rashemen.

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Spring came late amid heavy rainstorms and a sudden burst of new greenery along the treeline. The river swelled, and Georg complained that the young men of the militia spent too much time wooing farmers' daughters with the sprouting flowers. Rhythien shrugged at his exasperation, and challenged him to a sparring match instead. She discovered she could still handle a blade against a trained man, and was secretly pleased when he praised her. She found herself calling on Retta without prompting, and enjoying the older woman's company, and speaking more, and of her own volition.

She asked if Bevil had any plans to marry some comely village girl, and Retta laughed. "Some day," she answered. "I'm sure of it. I wondered once if he'd marry you, child."

She shifted uncomfortably. "I was never really right for him. Besides, he was stepping out with Amie."

"Yes, but he was always happier with you."

"That was a long time ago."

"A lot of things were," Retta said firmly. "Doesn't mean things can't change. How's Daeghun treating you?"

She smiled. "Fine."

"True enough?" Retta arched a graying eyebrow. "You and he surprise me both. Thought you hated him, growing up."

"No…we just never talked."

"Rocks talk more than he ever did." Retta laughed. "What about you, sweetheart? What do you plan for?"

She shrugged. "Do you know, I have no idea?"

"You'll know, come the time. Whatever it is." The other woman sighed expansively. "Come on, sweetheart. Those cabbages won't collect themselves."

Merchants passed through the village as the season warmed. Most heading for the trade routes to Neverwinter, they bought preserves and furs, bolts of cloth and weapons. Rhythien paid one to carry a letter to Duncan at The Sunken Flagon, letting him know she was still at West Harbour, and had no plans to leave anytime soon. She watched the merchant train trundle out of the village, past the huge old quartet of trees, and realized she felt no regret.

A scant two and a half years prior, she would have wanted to run after them, beg a space on the wagon, anything to get of this small swamp village. But that was before the shard, before Bishop and the King of Shadows, and before Akachi.

She spent most evenings with Daeghun, while he showed her how to fletch arrows the elven way, or else curled up with one of his books. She read and re-read a story about a brash adventurer who faced off against a dragon, came off best, and stole the creature's hoard single-handed to boot, leaving his companions in the lurch. She compared her own experience with fighting dragons and came a sore second. "Daeghun?"

He looked up from a pile of new arrows at the table. "Yes?"

"Did you ever fight a dragon?"

"Once, long ago. Just the one, unlike you."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"Most adventurers thank their stars they're still alive after the first and choose not to gallivant after the next two."

She remembered the black dragons in Nolaloth's valley and cringed. "We did not gallivant."

"Oh, I don't know. That paladin friend of yours seemed positively sprightly."

She peered at him over the edge of the book. "Are you making fun of me?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Not at all."

"What was your dragon like?"

"Big. Angry. Covered in scales."

She straightened up in the chair. "I sense there's a story there."

"Yes, there is." He leaned his chin on his hands. "Shayla and I were travelling with a couple of dwarves, and three humans. There was a red dragon terrorizing farmlands, so we agreed to hunt it. Some of us for the glory, some of us for the treasure, and some of us for the farmers."

She closed the book. "What happened?"

"The expected when one fights a dragon. A lot of running, screaming, and flailing. The dwarves and the humans went in first, while Shayla called up healing spells, and I stood on the edge of a crag and fired enough arrows to make my fingers bleed."

"You got the dragon?"

"Eventually." His hands ran along the new fletching thoughtfully. "Two of the humans were down, a broken leg and an ugly gash to the chest. The dwarves and the other man kept coming, stubborn as mules. Shayla picked up a sword and joined them, willful woman."

Rhythien smiled. His voice was lilting and easy, and she found herself watching the motion of his hands as he toyed with the new arrows.

"And I was stuck on this crag, with five arrows left, and wondering if I was about to see everyone seared in front of me." One side of his mouth shifted. "So I shot the dragon in the eyes, and the mouth."

"_You_ killed it?"

"We were never sure." He shrugged again. "The dwarves rushed it, and I shot it, and it fell over rather quickly after that."

Rhythien grinned. "You got the treasure?"

"Yes, every penny of it."

"I'm impressed." She flipped the book open, and watched as he lifted the next arrow, along with the feathers to be cut. "Daeghun?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you for telling me."


	4. Chapter 4

_This chapter is a little shorter than I planned, but the chapter break seemed natural, and I don't want the next one to feel forced or awkward in terms of pacing. So, disclaimer still there, I own nothing and no one except Rhythien. _

_**Chapter Four**_

Rhythien sat on the farmhouse porch, a basket beside her, and a half-mended shirt in her hands. Retta was nearby, her eyes pinned on her needle, and the tiny, pale threads darting through the cloth. Helping, although much slower, Rhythien dragged her gaze from her jagging line of stitches and across, to the open green between the houses.

The bare patch of earth was still there, the one she remembered simply _being there_. No grass had ever sprouted there, and the earth itself had always seemed curiously warm and dry, even when the autumn rains fell from angry clouds. She recalled how she had sat there, with Zhjaeve's soft voice in her ears, as the pieces of the silver sword had snapped together into a trembling, new blade, and the air sang.

"Retta?"

"Yes, child?"

"That bare patch of ground…was it like that, before the attack?"

The needle stilled. "You mean when you were small?"

She nodded.

Retta sighed, laid her half-finished tunic on her knees. "No," she said, softly. "Before that night, grass grew there."

"What happened?"

Retta frowned. "Are you certain you wish to know?"

"Yes."

"Terrible night, it was. I remember I heard it, the shouts and the sounds of people fighting." The older woman leaned back against the wall, her eyes wide with distance and memory. "Bevil was…oh, four or so. I handed him over to Lorne, and I went to find their father, and see what was happening outside."

Something cold touched her spine. She remembered Lorne, how he had strode away from West Harbour, and vanished somewhere in Luskan. How she had faced him in the arena in Neverwinter, and sliced his throat open after cutting his ankles out from under him. How she had snarled such terrible things at him before he died. How Casavir had flinched away from her afterwards, when she returned shaking and exhausted and soaked in blood that was mostly Lorne's.

"Everything was on fire," Retta said. "Or seemed to be. There were people everywhere, running and screaming. And _things_, things made of shadow. And right there, on the green, was…I don't know what it was."

Rhythien shivered; the King of Shadows, she knew. Tall and slender and dark as if cut from the cloth of night itself. She remembered its burning eyes, and the way its head had moved, fixing upon her as she raised the Sword of Gith.

"There was a wizard fighting it. Strange-looking man, with his face all afire with magic." Retta shook her head slowly. "I saw the sword he was holding…silver, and shining. I saw it break, when I was running. Bits of it, flying everywhere. Sweetheart…are you sure you want to hear this?"

She nodded again. "Please."

"I found Bevil's father, and some of the others. They were scared and hurt, but breathing. The wizard was gone, and so was whatever it was he was fighting." The creases between Retta's eyebrows deepened. "I checked on the children again, and then I realized I hadn't seen hide nor hair of your mother, or Shayla and Daeghun. I went out again, and I found Daeghun. He was…I found him holding you, and you were both covered in blood. You were crying. He'd cleaned you up, but he was bleeding himself, and you were both covered in it."

Rhythien swallowed. Her ribs felt tight, her throat painful. "Retta…"

"Your poor mother…she was nearby. Shayla, too, both of them." Retta blinked. "And Daeghun was just holding you, not saying anything, not looking at anything."

She opened her mouth, forced her lips to move properly. "What did you do?"

"I tried to take you off him." She shrugged, wry and sad. "He didn't let me. So, there it is."

"Thank you." She drew in a steadying breath, waited for the ache in her chest to subside a little. "Retta, what was he like? Before that?"

"If you're asking whether he talked more, no, he didn't." Retta grinned before brushing her knuckles across her eyes. "Always reserved, that one. Ever since I can remember. Shayla talked enough for both of them."

"What was she like?"

"Very pretty," the other woman answered. "Beautiful, in that elven way. Sent quite a few of our young men into a fluster, but she never had eyes for anyone else." Retta's gaze lifted, disarmingly gentle. "Go on, sweetheart. You want to ask about your mother?"

She nodded wordlessly.

"I never knew her well. When she came here, she was at least six, maybe even seven months gone with child."

"She wasn't married."

"No." Retta shook her head. "She never mentioned your father around me. She was strong-willed, very stubborn. She and Shayla were close, very close. I'm sorry, sweetheart. That's really all I know. She and I were never really more than acquaintances."

"Thank you for telling me."

Retta linked her arms over her head and stretched. "Not at all." She glanced past the younger woman's shoulder, to the early evening mist that mantled tree trunks and crawled across the thick grass. "Didn't I hear you promise to be back in time for dinner?"

Rhythien grinned then, properly. "I learned a recipe from a friend in Rashemen, and I'm going to try it out on Daeghun."

"Will I have to visit tomorrow morning to see if you're both still alive?"

"Have you no faith?" She pushed up to her feet, glanced ruefully at the basket of clothes waiting to be mended. "I didn't get through much of that."

"There's the whole summer, yet." Retta shrugged. "Come by tomorrow, if you want. Bevil said Tarmas is looking for another decent meal, so we should be expecting guests."

Rhythien's gaze lingered on the bare patch of earth again. "Retta?"

"Yes, child?"

"Why did you come back here?"

The older woman's mouth curled up. "The first time, or the second?"

"Both."

"I'm not sure," Retta said quietly. "I grew up in Neverwinter, but…I don't know. Sometimes, somewhere is home, and that's all there is to it."

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For the fourth time since she had begun cooking, Rhythien cast an appraising glance over her shoulder. Daeghun sat at the table, his shoulders rigid beneath his tunic, and she sensed how uncomfortable he found it, simply sitting, waiting for her to finish. The long fingers of one hand were locked around a cup, and the others were flattened against the table top. "Daeghun?"

"Yes?"

"You look like I'm about to shoot you between the eyes."

His pale eyes flicked up. "I am not used…"

"…to be being waited on?"

"Yes."

She gave him a quick smirk. "Tough."

She turned her attention back to the nearest bubbling pot, and inhaled. The strong scent of spices flooded her mouth and nose, and she nodded approvingly. Safiya had often livened up the most boring of trail stews, and, upon farewell, had given her a pouch full of spices that reminded her of nights spent around a guttering campfire, trying to keep the curse and the cold at bay with Thayan-style soup.

She heaped up two bowls, and smiled when she saw him eying the steaming contents. "It probably won't bite."

"I'm remembering the last time you made me eat something and wouldn't tell me what was in it."

She scooped up a spoonful of thick gravy, and muttered, "Don't remember."

"You were ten. You came home and told me you were going to cook for us. So you made…something."

She spluttered. "Oh, my great gods above. A woman makes you a meal, and you embarrass her? Have you no soul?"

One side of his mouth shifted. "Forgive me. It's actually rather good."

"So what disaster did I try and make, that time?"

"I don't know," he said, utterly flat. "It was…mostly charcoal. I have no idea what it was prior to that."

She snorted and dug her spoon in again. He spoke little after that, but she noticed he cleaned up the whole bowl, and that he responded to her smile when she collected the dishes. Much later, while thin rain streaked against the windows, and the slow summer twilight sank away, she curled on the floor in front of the empty fireplace while he sat at the smaller table and cleaned his bow and quiver.

He had always polished the bow to gleaming, she recalled, even if he had just returned from some exhausting month-long journey. She remembered him staggering in through the door, deep in a long-ago midwinter, shivering and with the tips of his fingers turning blue. She had offered to make him something, even just to slice bread and cold meat. He had turned her down, and told her to go to bed. She had stolen downstairs later, she remembered, and found him still poring over his bow.

"Daeghun?"

He did not look up. "Yes?"

"Where did you get your bow?"

"My bow?" His gaze flicked down it, elegant and curved on the table. "A long, long time ago. It would have been…oh, when Shayla and I were newly married."

She briefly wondered how long newly married lasted for an elf, but then she smiled. "Did you make it yourself?"

"No, not this one."

She had often found him carving arrows, or making smaller recurve bows in the shed behind the house, and even as a child, had envied the quick, agile way he worked.

She did not push him, only waited until he said, "Shayla's father gave it to me. He made it, many years before I married his daughter. It was a gift, he said, to help protect us both." His eyes closed. "Do you know, I once thought…" A shudder ran through him, and he said, "I once thought that I wanted to burn it. After…Shayla died. I wanted to burn it, and my quiver, and every arrow I did not shoot that night."

"You didn't."

"No, I didn't." His eyes dropped ruefully to the line of runes etched along the bow. "Maybe I should have. But…I made a fire, and I was going to. But it seemed…"

"Not right."

"No. Not right at all. May I ask you something?"

She straightened up a little, drew her knees up. "Of course."

He left the bow and quiver on the table, joined her on the old, faded rug. He sat cross-legged, with that easy, unthinking kind of elegance that had infuriated her no end when she had been younger. "When you and your companions ventured out into Merdelain…"

She remembered, bright and hard as a blade. Sand, reciting strange syllables from the Tome of Iltkazar, while Casavir hefted his shield and refused to meet her eyes, and Neeshka squeezed her shoulder. "Yes?"

"Before you left," Daeghun said slowly. "You avoided me."

"Yes." What else was left, but honesty, she wondered? "Yes, I did."

"Why?"

"Because…" She drew in a shuddering breath. "You arrived at the Keep, and that was a surprise in itself. I thought nothing would ever drag you out of the Mere."

He frowned. "Even after I told you what I knew, of the King of Shadows?"

"A little." She sighed. "I don't know. It was strange…I had left you behind, here, and suddenly, there you were. Offering your allegiance." She dredged up a half-smile. "And that dreadful trickery the day we burned the bridges."

He had the grace to look slightly guilty. "Yes. Forgive me for that…I had seen you, before you were sent to stop the shadows and the undead. You looked…so tired."

"A nice way of putting it." She had been close to breaking, and he must have seen it. His sudden appearance on the hilltops, while his ranger companions cut down the bone golems and forced Garius back, had both shocked her and woken a terrible kind of suspicion in her. She recalled confronting him later, demanding to know why the hells he thought he could do that to her and her friends, let them think they were about to die, and step in at the last moment and try to rescue them.

_He had looked at her_, she remembered. _Just looked at her, through those pale eyes, and turned away, and said nothing._

"I said some awful things to you that day."

"Perhaps." He raked a hand through his hair. "People say terrible things when they are made to do terrible things."

"Do you know," she said, haltingly. "I almost…I almost sent a runner for you, when we left. I almost…"

"Why didn't you?"

She shrugged helplessly. "I don't know."

"You thought you were never coming back."

"I was going up against the King of Shadows." She smiled nervously. "Of course I thought that. The terrible part is that I didn't think beyond that. I didn't let myself."

He nodded slowly. "I understand."

"You do?"

"The shadows in Merdelain…Rhythien, thinking of you, fighting them, in the very heart of that place…" His mouth tightened, and the gaze he trained on her was wide and worried. "_I _thought you were never coming back."

"But you searched for me."

"Yes. I did."

She glanced down at her hands, locked around her shins. Sidelong, she noticed him pluck idly at the ties on his boots. "Daeghun?"

"Yes?"

"What did you find, when you went to Merdelain?"

"Black stone and emptiness."

There was an odd, unreadable note in his voice. She lifted her head, shot a quick look in his direction, but his face was blank. Years ago, she would have interpreted that as him being angry, or disinterested. This time, she simply stood, and made her way across to the table and stepped past his quiver and bow. At the far end, she found two books, a comb, and an old, sheathed hunting knife.

She chose the comb and sat back on the rug, aware of his gaze. "Bevil said you went through Merdelain piece by piece."

"Yes. We found the dead, and the stone, and nothing more."

She flicked the long, loose ends of her hair over her shoulders, started dragging the comb through them. His watched her, his deepset eyes following the motion of her hands. "It was dismal enough when I was there. Can't imagine what it looked like to you, afterwards." The teeth of the comb snagged against a thick, twisting knot, and she swore.

"Rhythien?"

"Yes?"

He inclined his head. "May I?"

She paused. "Oh…of course."

Feeling uncommonly awkward, she turned around, facing away from him. He took the comb, and then she felt the soft, rhythmic movement of him drawing it through her hair. He was gentle, and his other hand moved to sweep loose tresses back over her shoulders. "You let it grow."

"Yes." She did not turn, only concentrated on the feel of the comb moving over her scalp. She heard leather creak behind her, and then the touch of his fingers again as he brushed flyaway strands out of her collar. "I probably shouldn't have. It's not the most practical when you're charging up on walking trees and Thayan wizards and the like."

"Perhaps." The comb travelled down her back again, and she felt his hand slide across the ends of her hair. "It suits you, though."

"Thank you." The comb and the feel of him close behind her retreated. She turned, a little surprised at the sudden warmth in her face. He said nothing, only sat poised at the other end of the rug. She glanced from him to the window, where she could see the rain, running in thick lines through the gap in the curtains. She excused herself quietly, muttering something about being tired, and how she hoped they might journey again soon, away from the village, and into the forest.

Upstairs, Rhythien firmly closed the door and padded to the bed, ignoring the darkness. The rain pattered against the panes, and she could hear the wind soughing through the trees outside. She burrowed under the blankets and tried to force her mind onto mundane things, onto how Georg had recently told her how her parrying was becoming sloppy, or that she had easily a basket-full of mending to help Retta with. How there was a merchant due through the village soon, so she could send another letter to Duncan in Neverwinter. Still, despite her best efforts, despite trying to let the rain lull her, it was a long time until sleep claimed her.


	5. Chapter 5

_Well, this is the last chapter of this story, so I very much hope that it works and is enjoyable. Of course, everything apart from Rhythien belongs to Bioware. _

_**Chapter Five**_

A mild summer dawn found Rhythien behind the Starling farmhouse, chopping wood with Bevil. She glanced across, saw that his pile was half again as high as hers. She frowned, and brought her axe down all the harder.

"It's not a race," he said lightly.

"It always used to be," she retorted.

He laughed. "True enough. And I would always win, and then Amie would tell you to stop sulking."

She drove the axe against the next log. "You would remember that part." Her hands juddered around the haft, and she swore. "You miss her."

His gaze jumped away. "Yes. Of course I do." He shrugged, heaved up another log. "But, Rhyth…do you know the worst thing? I miss her so much it hurts sometimes, but I think…if she hadn't died that night, would she have died when the village was attacked again? Or later, or at Crossroad Keep, or…?"

She nodded slowly. "I think I know what you mean."

He shrugged again, a little self-consciously. The axe snapped down onto the log, digging deep into the dry wood. "That's when I think everything changed."

"Amie, you mean?"

"Yes. You remember when we came to get you?"

Of course she did. She had fallen into uneasy dreams, troubled by strange thoughts and the too much wine she had drunk at the fair. Pounding on the door had jolted her awake, and she had blearily listened to Bevil and Amie spluttering something about grey dwarves and attackers, and odd creatures with swords. Daeghun had vanished, and they had ventured outside into the chill night air, only to find flames turning the sky crimson, and the noise of battle crashing across the green.

"I wasn't even thinking properly," Bevil added. "Everything seemed…I don't know. Bearable. The duergar, the bladelings…everything was bearable until Amie died. And then everything changed."

She nodded. "Yes."

There had been little space to mourn, either Amie or any of the other fallen. Upon retrieving the shard, Daeghun had packed her off to Highcliff with barely enough time to say farewells. She remembered blundering into the forest with enough food for a week or so, a sword slung at her hip, and the promise not to let anyone see the shard hidden in her pack ringing in her ears.

"It was strange, those days after you were gone." Bevil leaned against the low stone wall, the axe propped against his muscled shoulder. "Quiet. Like everyone was waiting for something awful to happen. My Ma finally told me what happened, years ago, with the attack, and your mother."

Rhythien left her axe buried in the log and joined him. "Bevil, what…what did Daeghun do?"

"After you left? Spent most of his time out of the village, gods know where. In the wilds, doing whatever rangers do, I suppose." Bevil's gaze leveled at her. "He seemed to know things. Seemed even more terse than normal. I tried cornering him a couple of times, but, well…you know how he is. Didn't want to talk."

"Yes." She smiled ruefully. "Yes, I know."

Bevil grinned, lifted the axe from his shoulder. "First to get through two piles?"

"Is that a challenge, Starling?"

"And if it is, Knight-Captain?"

This time, the mention of her former title did not sting. Instead, she smirked at him. "Then prepare to lose."

Much later, when the sun was high, and the wind sighing through the willow trees was soft and warm, Rhythien sprawled beside Bevil. He had been fairly gentlemanly about her defeat, and had even offered to carry their lunch to the riverbank. Now, they lazed by the water, while small birds fluttered in the trees on the other side and the clouds raced away above.

"Rhyth?"

"Yes?"

"Can I ask you something?"

She rolled onto her stomach and flicked breadcrumbs at him. "You never used to bother asking if you could, first."

"No, but that was before you were a Knight-Captain." He rubbed one hand against his stubble thoughtfully. "Rhyth, wasn't there a point when you wanted to say no?"

"What do you mean?"

"To Sir Nevalle, and Lord Nasher, and all of Neverwinter…didn't you ever want to say no?"

"More times than I can count." She shrugged idly. "What could I have done? Told Lord Nasher Alagondar exactly what to do with his titles and his promises?"

"I suppose not." Bevil's gaze lingered on the play of sunlight on the river. "You must have been tempted."

She laughed, a little forced. "More than a few times, I'll give you that."

"Rhyth?"

"Yes?"

Bevil's eyes shifted from the water, fixed on her. "I'm glad you came back."

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She trailed a path past delicate patches of snowdrops and around the whorled base of an ancient tree. The air was clear and warm this morning, the loam beneath her feet dry. She made her way through a small glade, and across the stepping-stone bridge over the river. Deeper in the forest, it was wider, and rushed and seethed against the sloping banks. Tangled weeds descended into the water and bunched against half-buried boulders. She picked her way alongside the river until the trees rose thick and close around her, and the air was dense.

"Alright, I know you're out here somewhere." She planted her hands on her hips and glanced around. "Daeghun? Where are you? Bevil said he'd seen you heading out this way. Daeghun?"

Something rustled behind her, and she turned to see him standing before a high stand of ferns. His head was tipped quizzically to one side. "You came looking for me?"

"Well, you said we were going to head up towards the mountains. I…was worried you'd gone without me."

His pale eyes widened a fraction. "No. I came out to get supplies."

"Oh. Did you find anything?"

"Deer."

He guided her back to the village, though she was certain she knew the half-hidden path by now. There, he cut and dressed the meat while she found bread and hard biscuit. She buckled her sword on over her leathers, though she found she had no wish to use it. She checked in briefly with Retta, letting her know they would be gone some days.

Returning with a wrapped fruitcake, she found Daeghun waiting beside the bridge. As always, without speaking, he led her through the forest, and into the marshes. This early in the summer, the water was high and the reeds lush and rattling in the wind. He wove a trail across damp hummocks and between deep pools until the swamp fell behind, and the ground firmed underfoot.

Some four days of unhurried walking brought them to pine forest, and the smell of dropped needles. The sun was sinking by the time Daeghun called a halt. She gathered wood for a small fire while he scouted for wolves. Apparently satisfied, he sat beside her while the sun vanished and mist coiled around low branches. After a quick dinner of cold meat and bread, she stared into the flames, and he oiled his longbow. Looking up from the fire, she watched the movement of his slender hands, running up and down the bow. She remembered thinking his elvish grace to be almost unsettling in the way he moved soundlessly over floorboards that seemed to creak for everyone else.

After checking over the fletching on his arrows, and the buckles on his quiver, Daeghun laid his weapons down. She sensed rather than heard his exhalation as he gazed at the fire and the mist beyond.

She listened to the evening sounds of the forest and wondered if this was peace.

Not quite allowing herself to think about it, she leaned her head against Daeghun's shoulder.

A shudder rippled through him, but he did not move, did not extricate himself from her. Instead, very carefully, he slipped an arm around her waist. "Rhythien?"

"Yes?"

He shook his head slightly. "Nothing."

She smiled. "When you have nothing to say, you generally don't bother telling me that."

"True enough." His fingers tightened against her hip. "Do you mind?"

"No."

The fire died down into flaring embers. The night smelled of pine sap and charcoal, and the clean scent of Daeghun's skin near hers. When his arm moved, and he straightened away from her, she felt a curious pang of regret.

"Are you tired?"

She shook her head. "I'll take first watch."

He nodded, and left her alone with the gloom while he curled up in blankets near the glowing remains of the fire. The shadows here were full of shifting moonlight, and the wind rustled through leaf-heavy branches. She glanced down at him and supposed he was in reverie, dreaming of old things. He seemed pale as cut marble, his face denied the hard intensity of his waking gaze.

Her watch passed without upset, and she spent most of it staring at the black of the pine trees above the line of mist, or the wash of dark sky above that. When she swapped places with Daeghun, she wrapped herself in the blankets and turned towards him before she drifted into sleep.

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She jolted out of a dark, troubling dream. She stared down at her hands, saw that they shook uncontrollably. Her mouth felt dry, her face speckled with sweat. She registered new flamelight, and the sound of water bubbling. A shadow slanted across her, and she jumped.

"It's only me." Daeghun pressed a hot mug into her hands. "Drink this. It will warm you."

Her fingers trembled horribly around the handle, and he steadied.

"May I ask you what you dreamed?"

She blew on the drink, and the steam touched her face. "I was standing before the Betrayer's Gate again. Except this time, I was alone, and my scar hurt, and I knew if I stepped through, I would die. No…worse than die. Become like all those other spirit-eaters…become lost to the curse."

He watched her impassively. "Are you afraid to die?"

"No." She sipped at the hot liquid, and the fresh, clean taste of rosemary flooded across her tongue. "I was when I left the first time. For months, I was scared I would die. Thugs in the Docks, the orcs in the Sword Mountains, githyanki, Lorne Starling...gods, I never slept that night before I fought him."

She had paced the floor in the Temple of Tyr instead, too aware of the tight knot of fear lodged somewhere in her chest. But Lorne had fallen, like all the others, like Zeeaire and the Luskan assassins in Solace Glade, like Logram Eyegouger and Quaggoth-Yeg.

"But then when we were sent to Crossroad Keep to take it back from Garius, I was badly injured."

"A collection of mercenaries and adventurers, and a handful of wizards." Some unreadable note smoked through his voice.

She smiled. "You remembered. I was hurt, and I remember lying there with a hole bigger than my fist in my lower back. It was strange – there was no pain. We had few potions, and our healers were exhausted, and I had to wait out the night for them to recover. I thought the strangest things that night."

"What things?"

"How it felt to have a piece of flesh missing. Whether the scar would match the one on my chest. How it no longer hurt, and whether that meant I was about to die. How I wanted my friends to stop bothering me and just go to sleep, because if I was going to die, then them staying awake was unlikely to stop it. And then I realized the one thing I was not feeling was frightened."

"There are far worse things to fear."

"Yes." Like the hunger, she thought, that left her crippled with uncertainty and the terrible knowledge of what she could become.

"Go back to sleep," Daeghun said. "I'll sit watch until dawn."

This time, she spiraled into slumber that was black and warm and undisturbed.

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The morning brought sunlight and clear skies, and she followed Daeghun up through the rolling slopes towards the grey of the mountains. He mentioned that he and Shayla and some friends had once journeyed the length and back of the towering peaks, but he did not explain further, and she did not push him.

Seven days of idle meandering took them back down into the marshes, and through dense brush and hanging vines. They picked a campsite far from the main trail, where small streams wound through the soft soil and circled stands of tall trees. Mist clung to leaves and moss and small, round rocks, and as the sun faded away, the rain fell.

"I used to hate the rain here," she said.

"Why?"

"I'm not sure." The drizzle was light still, sifting through the branches and feathering against her hair where she sat beside him. "I think I hated West Harbour as well."

"And me?"

"No. No, I never hated you. I never told you otherwise, but I never hated you."

The small movement at the corners of his mouth lent her courage, and she rested her head against his shoulder again. A moment passed, and he settled his arm around her. This time, his fingers trailed up her back, tangling in the loose ends of her hair. The sensation was strange, soothing and enticing at the same time.

"Why did you come back?"

"To see you."

"Rhythien…"

"Yes?"

He shook his head silently. His hand moved, delving into her hair. She raised her head from his shoulder and looked at him. They had made no fire this evening, and he was pale in the gloom. She reached up, brushed his rain-damp hair away from his ear. He leaned into her touch for a long moment before he froze.

"I have not," he began, and stopped. "It has been a long time…"

She did not push him, did not speak. Only sat there when he lifted a hand to touch her forehead, the slant of her cheekbones, her chin. His fingers shook as he traced around her mouth.

"Rhythien, is this what you want…?"

"Yes."

His hands descended past her throat, to the ties of her tunic. He fumbled the knots, and she hid a slight smile at seeing how nervousness spoiled his grace. He glanced back up to her eyes, and she saw that he was trembling all over.

As, she realized, was she. Very gently, he cupped her face, and waited as if for permission. When she did not pull away from him, he smiled. A strange, unfamiliar sort of a smile, full of apprehension and hope. And when he claimed her lips, all thoughts fled, save for her discovery that the inside of his mouth was warm and tantalising. After that, there were no words, as he drew her down beside him; only sighs, and whispers, and soft cries as they clung to each other.

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She woke to the unusual sensation of bare skin against her own, and moss near her head, and the early morning chill making her gasp.

"Are you cold?" Daeghun asked.

She turned over properly, saw that he wore nothing but dew and a tentative smile. "Mmm. A little."

He shifted, drew the blankets up around her. His fingers played across her collarbone, and down to the wide scar. "Does it still hurt?"

"It aches sometimes."

"I am sorry," he said, haltingly. "About what I told you…about it. About not telling you about the shard."

"Ssh. It's done. It's over." She curled up against him, and sighed when his arms closed around her. "Daeghun?"

"Yes?"

"How old are you?"

He half-smiled. "I have more than two centuries behind me."

She rested the side of her face against his shoulder, breathed in the scent of his skin. "I'm going to die a lot earlier than you, aren't I?"

"Some things are never certain."

"But you are an elf."

"Yes." He combed the ends of his fingers through her hair, lightly stroking. "I would rather…not talk of such things. Not today."

She nodded. "I understand. I'm sorry."

"Don't be." He smiled, and it reached his eyes as he looked at her. "I'm not."

They took their time returning to the village, following meandering trails and never hurrying. She found her eyes lingering on him as he walked ahead of her, or else noticing how he kept turning, as if checking that she was still there. At nights, he started sharing her watch, muttering something about how elves required little sleep, or reverie, or whichever. She became used to sitting out the darkness with him beside her, an arm around her shoulders, or else tangled with him in front of the fire.

When the trees opened up around the trail again, and she saw the familiar curve of the green between the houses, Rhythien paused. Something lodged in her chest, something very close to regret. "Daeghun?"

He stopped beside her, and his fingers brushed again hers. "Yes?"

"This…what happened…you're not going to forget...?"

His hand tightened around hers. "No." He leaned in, and kissed her, slowly and deliberately. "I am not going to forget."

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It was many months before she spent the night with him in West Harbour. Some days, he would vanish upstairs early, and she would find herself suddenly too awkward, or uncertain. Others, she would catch him downstairs, and they would exhaust each other on the rug in front of the fireplace, and she would not know how to ask to simply sleep next to him later. In the forest, when she journeyed with him, such difficulties seemed to melt away; there were no doors, no questions, and he seemed more than content to while away the days beside her.

Rhythien sat coiled in her favourite chair, listening to the rain hammering against the walls outside. A book lay on her knee, half-forgotten. The fire crackled, almost down to glowing embers.

A shadow swept across the open doorway, and she looked up into Daeghun's angular, pale face. He wore an open-necked shirt over his breeches, and she noticed that his feet were bare. "Aren't your feet cold?"

"A little." His gaze flicked across her, then away, to the walls, the rug. "Rhythien…do you want to come upstairs?"

She smiled, unsteadily. "I thought you'd want to be alone."

"No…I just wasn't sure how to ask you."

"Oh." She laughed then, a gulping, relieved kind of a laugh. "We make quite the pair, don't we?"

"So it seems. I should have…" He shook his head. "I should have asked you long before this. I'm sorry."

"No, don't be. I just…I know you like being by yourself."

"Yes. But I like being with you, as well."

He held out his hand, and she clasped it, and let him lead her upstairs, into his room. He helped her out of her clothes, and she pulled his shirt over his head, and marveled again at how smooth and pale his skin was. Afterwards, they simply lay next to each other, her head against his chest, and his arm around her waist.

"Daeghun?"

"Yes?"

"Do you…worry what people will think?"

"About…us?"

"Yes."

His head turned, and she saw him frown. "I'm not sure," he said. "I…wonder. I will admit that. I mean…"

"I know."

"Do you worry?"

She traced a hand across his bare chest, felt him shiver in response. "Three years ago, I would have worried. I would have probably kept myself awake wondering what people might be saying to each other."

"And now?"

"Now?" Her fingers skimmed over his collarbone, and up, into his loose hair. "I've done worse things, and cared less of what people might think."

Like when she succumbed to the hunger, or gave herself to a traitor, or slaughtered the dreaming witches; but these things were all in the past, and she found that the recollection of them hurt less.

He laughed, soft and quiet and still so unusual, from him. "A compliment, I assume?"

"Hah. Yes, indeed." She moved slightly, and trembled when his hands moved, cupping her face and stroking through her hair. "Daeghun?"

He kissed her temple. "Yes?"

"I…like this, very much."

"So do I."

There was a questioning, hopeful note in his voice. She smiled, and curled herself properly against him. "Good."

Beside the bed, a single candle fluttered, lit only after she reminded him that her eyes were not elvish, and that she would blame stubbed toes and knocked shins on him. The light spilled over the bare walls, and the fall of the curtains, and the clothes chest. Two bows were hung near the windows, quivers alongside. She recognized elven runes, and Daeghun's own handiwork in the stitching around the straps on the quivers. There was a table as well, scattered with feathers for fletching, a book, and two plates, and nothing else.

"Daeghun, did you ever consider…I don't know. Moving into a different house?"

For a long moment, he was silent. "You're not really asking that, are you?"

She said nothing.

"Yes, this is the same room I've always slept in," he said, his tone edged and a little wary. "Is that what you were asking?"

"I suppose." She chewed on her lower lip. "No, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything."

"You're young, you're human, you're far too curious, and you can be forgiven." He brushed her hair away from her cheekbone. "I am…not at ease, talking of such things."

"I know." She turned her face against his chest, listened to the way his heartbeat had quickened. She remembered snarling such terrible things at him, growing up, that she could not stand his silence, and his absences, and how he never smiled. "I never knew, did I? How you felt."

"About what?"

"About Shayla." The name felt suddenly easier on her lips, even in this room. "About what happened to her. About Esmerelle. About me."

"No, you didn't." He shifted, slid back slightly on the pillows so he could look at her properly. Something in his pale gaze cut through her. "But then, I never let you."

Rhythien drew in a slow breath. "Well, perhaps now we have time to learn, don't we?"

"Yes," Daeghun said. "Yes, I think perhaps we do."


End file.
